In O's minors, another way to look at catching statistics (plus another Davis take)

Caught-stealing percentage is a statistic that provides information, but sometimes doesn't provide anywhere near a complete story on a catcher.

We can look on a stat page and see that a catcher threw out 35 percent of attempted base stealers. Does that make him better than the catcher who threw out 30 percent?

Not necessarily, and there are good reasons for that. When it comes to Orioles minor league catchers, this past season the coaching staff at each affiliate started to keep the catcher's "true" caught-stealing percentage.

O's director of player development Brian Graham explains exactly what that means.

"This year in the minor leagues, we had the coaches start keeping if they had a chance or they didn't have a chance. Get a true throw-out percentage. You see catchers throw out 24 or 25 percent and then you go back and evaluate the percentage in terms of whether the pitcher was 1.3 (seconds) or better (in throwing to the plate from the stretch). Also you look at if the pitch was a breaking ball in the dirt, the catcher gets a stolen base against him, but it was a breaking ball he was blocking in the dirt. And if the pitcher was 1.6 to the plate, the catcher can't throw anyone out on that."

For a catcher, there is much involved in whether he can throw a runner out trying to steal. That pitch in the dirt or a slow time to the plate by the pitcher - nothing he controls - will show up on his stat sheet.

"So sometimes catchers' throw-out rates are low, and yet, when you evaluate the pitches they actually had a chance on, we had guys at 50 percent on pitches where they can actually throw a guy out. We're just looking for an average, decent time (from the pitcher to the plate) and if the pitch didn't hit the ground," Graham said.

Caleb Joseph could go 1-for-3 for the Orioles one night throwing out runners. But if on one of those attempts the pitcher did a poor job with his time to the plate and on another pitch the ball hit the dirt in front of the plate, it would be very hard to throw out either runner. In the stat sheet he is 1-for-3. On pitches where he truly had a real chance to get the runner, he went 1-for-1.

Chance Sisco, the Orioles' highest-rated catching prospect last year was 15-of-74 throwing out runners at Single-A Frederick for 20.3 percent. He was 10-for-25 at Double-A Bowie for 40.0 percent. Same guy, but with two different teams. While other minor league catchers are ahead of Sisco on defense right now, his improvement with the glove is a key to his future progress toward the majors. This past year, just looking at that stats, we don't know for sure whether he made improvement during the year or perhaps he just got better opportunities to throw out runners at Bowie.

"It really gives you a better way to evaluate who your good catchers are," Graham said. "Because when they get to the big leagues, you get better pitches on which to throw guys out and pitchers hold runners on better. So you really need to evaluate your catchers in the minor leagues differently."

Still no deal for Davis: Wiith a Scott Boras client, I guess we should not be surprised that Chris Davis continues to be a free agent. The reason for that is obvious: Boras and Davis don't have a deal they like enough to sign right now. Do they even have offers beyond the one from the Orioles? There are times when the deal they won't sign right now might be the one they decide to sign later. But for the Orioles, this saga continues to hang over their heads a bit.

I just don't think Davis is worth a $150 million contract, but I also know how well his left-handed bat fits into the Orioles lineup and how much he means to their offense. If they added two significant players with that money, that is probably the best play at this point.

It looks like the Davis situation will last through the holidays. Not a great scenario for the Orioles, who need to "build their roster" as Dan Duquette might say. They have more building to do and 2016 is almost here.